A lot of people are probably used to Tesla’s unconventional antics by now. While excitement continues to swirl around the newly announced 2021 Model S and Model X Plaid, there is a particular feature that is somewhat questionable, and it’s a key one at that – the yoke steering wheel.
New for both the sedan and SUV is the U-shaped steering yoke with the top half of the rim literally missing. This has been seen on concept cars for decades, but none actually made it to production because of its impracticality. How would you park your car, or make U-turns when grabbing a fistful of air?
There’s only one way the yoke wheel will make it to production, and that is with a significantly quicker steering rack. Most race car steering wheels have a very narrow degree of travel (Formula One cars have a steering lock of 17 degrees), so to make the controversial steering wheel useable, the Model X and Model S will need to have a tighter travel window.
To shed light on the legality of the matter, Road & Track reached out to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), who replied: “At this time, [the] NHTSA cannot determine if the steering wheel meets Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards. We will be reaching out to the automaker for more information.” Could it be that all this is just for show? Maybe. What do you think?
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Its impractical and dangerous, a quicker steering wheel while doing the century sprint in hands of amateurs spells disaster
BMW has been doing variable steering rate since the E90. Don’t see how it can’t be done.
Considering everything is electric and drive by wire now.
But FWIW I still prefer a hydraulic fact.
I dont think a steering lock of 17 degs makes sense
When a piece of vehicle navigation tool updated to enhance A.I commands operation of vehicle mobility with safety prioritize there’s nothing wrong nor against the law.
so does the side windows camera on Lexus that replaced conventional mirrors. Should amend these archaic road and transportation laws to keep up in time for progressive technologies lifestyle.
It’s only illegal when you modified a conventional vehicle steering wheel that jeopardize safety.
Conventional vehicles needs the driver to maneuver the vehicle with total manual mode.
I thought Tesla still needs the driver to do most of the steering, no? Therefore if the wheel is impractical so is the steering.
Mungkin jalanraya yang kena ubah
Someone needs to tell Elon to start selling tesla in Malaysia
Why not ask our gov to make the policy friendlier and start to discuss on that infrastructure first?
there’s a few parts to the new interface.
first, they expect that the car will be in full-self driving mode all the time, so trying to discourage driving by making the wheel as redundant as possible.
legally, i don’t think there’s any car capable to do level 5. level 3 is still under testing. level 3 will also be an issue like how fast does a human need to take over?
another things about the the driving interface is the lack of gear selector and stalk. Elon Musk already said that they don’t want it because the car will “guess” the direction of travel and act accordingly. nothing could go wrong, right? it will be safe, right?
so tesla is basically a car company who hate “cars”. for them, it’s a mobility solution from point a to point b that happens to be electric.